The challenges of emergency calls

Today is no different than any other holiday. We have dealt with drunks,drunk drivers and family fights.  I think I understand why it happens near the holiday season.  It's all because of the stress of money and having to deal with family members you only see a few times a year.  I am not without issues either.  My own family treats me different because I expressed my opinion that my sister could not come to a family function at my residence.  This upset my mom who now barely talks to me.  It's bad and upsetting.  But my sister is all drama and rumors.   I have had such a better second half of the year without dealing with her.  Work is bad enough drama wise.  We have an employee who never should have been able to keep their job with their parent being an upper supervisor over our direct supervisor.   Everything they want and ask for they get.  And whenever they tattle about bogus things then it comes back as coming ...

We all love new stuff right?  There is always that excitement when we unwrap or open that new package that has just arrived.  And then the anxiety set in when we actually try to use or operate that device or item.  The stress over doing something wrong, pushing the wrong button, breaking a piece during assembly or adjustments.  Tonight is no different.  We received some updated new equipment bringing us very high tech.  I have been excited about it early on, as it got busier today I struggled.  I had decided earlier in the shift I was going to be open to it, although it would hurt my normal routine.  I will adjust.  I didn't mind it and spent several hours trying to determine if I was handling it properly. I at one point decided that I wanted to go without it for a while slowly breaking myself in.  And then I realized how much easier after I had gotten used to it, that it actually was with little struggle.  I ended up a short time...

Normalcy, it means a state of normal, the common, the same, nothing new.  I have never said there was any normality or normalcy with this job.  It's kind of what makes it interesting. When I first started dispatching I came in, and came to work scared, scared not because I didn't feel like I could do the job or was alone.  I was scared of what that next call would be.  I like to be prepared, I like to plan, and schedule things.  Emergency situations are the total opposite of how I like my personal life to be.  I like to know my bills will be the same amount every year, I stress over abnormal bills, or differences.  It throws off my normalcy! I spend many shifts finding entertainment for myself, much like this blog.   Blogging about the happenings of the shift or lack there of.   I find myself upset on some shifts, that I don't have things to do.   Then I find myself upset on other shifts because I fix the mistakes from the other shif...

There is an old tradition for the public to go totally wild during certain times of the month and year.  These typically involve a large white ball in the sky displayed during the night, as well as during any national holiday.   I had never really believed it until my first come times having the holiday effect.  There are some holidays which typically result in more EMS calls, such as Thanksgiving, and Easter, often due to heart issues.  Then you have the holidays and unofficial instances that cause police issues.  These are commonly Super Bowl Sunday, Saint Patrick's Day, and of course the 4th of July.  These are all a toss up for fights, alcohol poisoning, or a variety of other calls.  This holiday was no different.  We had a called in bar fight.  We had an over consumption of alcohol.  We had a fight at a convenience store.  It was a barrel of fun, not!

             This phrase seems to pop up quite often.  I found myself just this thing and actually laughing when an officer directed me to log an issue that a citizen advised him of. I had taken a 911 call for a possible intoxicated driver, a dark colored Camaro, driving 45 mph, with it's high beam headlights on and swerving all over the roadway.  I give this call to the county.  They later locate and stopped the suspect vehicle to find out the driver is not impaired, but having issues with the ball joints and its causing issues with steering and handling.   This situation is as dangerous as being intoxicated, its not safe to have a vehicle with such issues on the road knowing it has problems. So its mid week, and it started off rather calm.  They had already been dealing with an ongoing yearly issue.  Each year a farmer complains about people parking along his field which borders the city ball diamonds.  And each...

You know I told you last post that I said the word, one of many which is frowned upon, and almost a ritual to avoid, and well it happened.  Within a matter of about 20 minutes I ended up with 3 calls for service. 1st - caller is reporting that she heard someone messing around and beating on something.  She was inside a fenced in area smoking and heard it, so she yelled out and asked them what they were doing as she was attempting to see what they were doing and she saw someone run to a vehicle.  They jumped into a vehicle and left.  The caller did not know what they were messing with or if they had tampered with anything.  My officer responds and is unable to locate any vehicle matching the description given. 2nd - Caller is reporting that he got a call from a renter that about 2 hours prior someone he had told he would take some wood from, hauled the base of a tree over and dumped it in the ditch and then attempted to push it off the road with a van.  ...

So here we are another day of rather nothing.  I really intended to sit down and write something the other day when I posted a bunch of rants about the newbie.  It doesn't get any better than what is going on now.   Newbie has a family member who was pregnant, and it was not their first child.  They saw the need to make changes to the schedule and make trades to get the day off, obviously with no sick days to use, so they had to utilize a shift trade.  I think everyone here is has been down and morale is bad because of situations such as this.  We are now on the 4th new hire in the past 5 years.  I know this is nothing for some agencies who are what it appears as a rotating door. I at one point thought I would be writing out calls with generic details here, as well as "Live" tweeting calls as they came in.  But damn, I work at a slow agency.   Crap, I did it, something will happen now.  Just like in EMS, certain words were never to be...

I cannot express how busy my life has been, not a lot has changed.  I am still busy with work, like every other dispatch agency.  Its been over a year since I last posted, which is terrible and probably means that no one is still reading this blog, and that it is not being indexed as often as it could be. I have been contemplating the past week of writing.  I have been listening to podcasts while at work for entertainment, and was also thinking about "the book" I was writing at one time.  I have several pages of notes compiled into a document sitting on my desktop.  I buried it in another folder a few weeks ago thinking more about it.  I don't obviously have the several thousands required to get it published.  My only option will be hoping it will sell some copies on an E-book site. But back to the reason I haven't wrote anything.  I haven't been exactly open with my followers I prefer to be more anonymous.  But I am married and I have a...